Administration deals a blow to Big Oil and its cronies in Congress, takes a stand for Americans' health and livelihoods, and a safe climate

Today, the Obama administration rejected the permit for the Keystone
XL tar sands oil pipeline sought by Canadian oil firm TransCanada,
determining that the project was not in the national interest.

"President Obama has shown bold leadership in standing up to Big Oil
and rejecting the Keystone XL pipeline," said Erich Pica, president of
Friends of the Earth. "The climate movement took on Goliath and won,
demonstrating its growing strength. Sustained grassroots pressure aimed
at holding the president accountable to the public interest proved more
powerful than all the lobbyists and campaign cash the oil industry could
muster."

This iconic David versus Goliath victory was fueled by years of
persistent grassroots campaigning to stop the project led by indigenous
activists, environmentalists, farmers, ranchers and youth climate
activists. Americans submitted more than 250,000 public comments against
the proposal, several thousand more turned out in small-town Nebraska,
in Texas and in Washington, D.C. to testify against the pipeline in
public hearings -- and 1,253 people played a pivotal role in August by
getting arrested during peaceful sit-ins on the president's doorstep.

Investigative efforts led by Friends of the Earth and allies exposed
the State Department's review process as hopelessly corrupted by conflicts of interest and oil industry cronyism in advance of President Obama's call for a new review of the project in November.

"Today's announcement is a welcome example of President Obama
following through on his promise that corporate polluter lobbyists will
no longer set the agenda in Washington," said Pica. "The Keystone XL
pipeline would have been dirty at both ends, dangerous in between, and
certainly not in our national interest. Big Oil and its
bought-and-paid-for confederates in Congress couldn't drown this dirty
reality despite all of their threats and bullying."

"This defeat for Big Oil is a huge victory for the health and safety
of Americans. It belongs to the indigenous communities who first sounded
the alarm on the dangers of tar sands extraction, to the Nebraskan
farmers and Texan ranchers who withstood TransCanada's bullying in the
name of their land and livelihoods, to the activists from across the
country who were arrested on the president's doorstep, and to all of us
fighting for a safe climate and justice-fueled future," said Pica.

The Keystone XL pipeline would have pumped the world's dirtiest oil
-- tar sands oil -- from Canada across America's heartland to Texas. The
nation's top climate scientist, Dr. James Hansen, has said that fully
exploiting the tar sands could destabilize the climate to the point of
no return. Tar sands extraction is poisoning water downstream from the
massive mining sites in Canada and tar sands refining would have
increased air pollution that causes lung disease and other respiratory
diseases in communities near refineries in Texas.

"Allowing expansion of the destructive tar sands oil industry is not
and will never be in our nation's interest. We will remain vigilant to
ensure that all of Big Oil's attempts to wring profits from the tar
sands at the public's expense are defeated -- and that better, clean
alternatives are deployed," said Pica.